Red vs Blue: The Valhalla Chronicles Season 1
by EvilProduct
Summary: Spoilers for Red vs Blue and possibly Halo 3, I own neither of them. I just had to continue the chronicles of Red vs Blue. Rated M for strong language! Please Review! I love reviews! Season 2 has been released! AU.
1. No Really, Why The Hell Are We Here?

**Red vs. Blue 2: The Valhalla Chronicles**

**Episode 101 – No Really, Why the hell are we here!?**

Blood Gulch was quiet. It had been two years since that fateful day, that day that Tex died. Nothing much had changed. Both the Red and Blue teams had stopped calling command, Sarge especially. After hearing that Vic Jr. was the command for both teams, he had all but lost his fighting spirit. It was lucky he had Grif to vent to…or shoot at. Simmons was still as much a kiss-ass as he always was. Every other word out of his mouth was 'Yes sir, Sarge!' What a brownnoser. We still weren't sure of Donut's sexuality…I mean he had decorated the red base with flowers and stuff (That is until Sarge burned it all). Caboose was…was…do I really need to explain how Caboose was? Tucker had grieved over the death of his 'son' for about 5 seconds. He had almost resigned and gone home, but we convinced him that his home was probably long gone and we were the only family he had. At times, I think he misses Tex as much as I do. Oh, by the way, I'm Private Leonard L. Church of the Blue squad. I'm not really sure why the Red squad is our enemy…hell I even like some of them. But, we're here…in Blood Gulch…for 5 goddamn years! I guess it's more like 1005 in my life though, but I won't get into that. I'm here to narrate. Anyway, our story continues on one quiet…boring…mind-numbing…ugh, just listen up.

----------

I was waiting outside the Blue base. Doc was downstairs, with Sister. Ever since she had arrived in Blood Gulch, Doc had been infatuated with her. They have been having sex in the base daily. Her screams get annoying. It's not fair, Doc with Sister. Normally I'm just here to keep Tucker from running in on them 'unintentionally'. I swear to god, if he doesn't stop being a pervert I'm going to shoot him. I had something to ask Doc, but I guess it can wait until he finishes working on Sister. I got up from my seat and walked over to the mongoose. That's just one of the new inventions that Sarge had come up with. Personally, I think it looks more like a lizard. It still worked though. I revved the engine and drove across the clearing toward Red base.

I could hear screams of terror coming from the base. That was normal. Sarge was just playing Grifball. He just ran around chasing Grif with a Gravity Hammer in a fenced off area behind the base. Donut was outside on the top of the base.

"Hey Donut." I said

"Hi Church! How are you?" he replied. I wish he would stop doing that. If we ever find proof that he's a heterosexual, I for one will be amazed.

"Yeah…I'm fine."

"You want to watch Sarge play Grifball? There's a great view of the court from up here." What the hell, there's nothing else to do.

"Yeah, sure." I walked up the stairs on the side of the base to watch the game. Caboose and Simmons were up there too.

"Hey Blue." Simmons said. As much as Sarge was now opposed to the war, Simmons was still referred to the blue team in that way…Kiss-ass.

"Hello Church!" Caboose yelled. I kind of liked his stupidity. He always looked at things in the best ways. I often wondered what it was like in his world…then again I hated it in his head, especially since the last time I was there. I looked down to the backyard of the base. Sarge had fenced off a large area, about the size of a basketball court, with which to play Grifball in. His favorite version of the game was the one where he just chased Grif around with a hammer. Normally, Grif carried around a bomb and we all joined in. Today, Sarge was hard at work…wow that sounded weird.

"AHHHHHH! GET HIM AWAY FROM ME DAMMIT! I HATE THIS GAME!" Grif yelled. The gravity hammer slammed the ground behind him.

"Quiet Grif! This is the best game since itself!" Sarge replied. He swung with the Gravity Hammer once again. This time it hit Grif. He was sent flying across the court outside of the fence. Everyone laughed. "Get up you big baby! That was only round 357! We still got a lot to go!"

"ugggg…just leave me here to die…uggg" Grif said. I smiled. The day was going smoothly. I just sat against the hard cement of the red base and relaxed. It was just a few minute until I was asleep.

----------

Dreams. I like dreams. They were the only thing dragging me away from the mind-numbing experience of living in Blood Gulch. However, I didn't always have dreams. Sometimes Tex was in them. I didn't really classify them as dreams, mostly because they all ended with that damn explosion. I didn't blame Sarge because he put Andy on the ship, I blamed Andy for exploding. I like that O'Malley is gone, but he was infecting Tex at the time. As much as she ignored me in the time she was here, I admit that I still had feelings for her. I woke up after the explosion happened once again. I didn't realize it, but I had awoken screaming.

"TEEXX!" I yelled. I looked around after my yell, seeing if anyone had heard it. It was night, I had been asleep for a few hours at best. Caboose sat next to me.

"Are you okay Church?" he asked. I nodded my head.

"Yeah, I'm fine Caboose."

"You want a blanket! It's cold out." I chuckled at the offer.

"No, it's okay Caboose. I'm fine."

"Oh, oh, oh! Um…Tucker wanted to see you! He told me earlier. He said…'get Church over here you…well, I don't want to repeat the last part…it was mean."

"Jesus, what does he want now?" I said. I walked down the stairs to my mongoose. I asked Caboose to get on the back. He liked it on the back of the mongoose. I warned him not to fall off again. Yeah, that had happened before. Luckily we got back to Blue base safely. I went into my room on the bottom floor. I laid on the floor and went to sleep again. AH! I can't get Tex off my mind. I like that I dream about her, but I hate that that damn explosion replays over and over again. I awoke about 8 hours later to Tucker's yells.

"Church! Church! Get up here you lazy bastard!" I ran to the grav lift and up the ramp to the outside of the base. Tucker and Caboose were on the roof.

"What's going on?" I yelled. Caboose pointed behind me to the open plains of Blood Gulch.

"Shi…Shi…Big big ship!" he mumbled. I turned around to see a Pelican transport ship lowering to the ground. It was really weird that it was here, considering we thought that the UNSC could give less of a shit that we were here. The pelican lowered to the ground. When it finally hit, all of us raised our guns. I, my sniper rifle, Tucker, his battle rifle, hell even Caboose raised his gun. When the door finally opened…I almost fainted. There in the light of the pelican…stood Master Chief himself!


	2. Master Freakin Chief

**Episode 102 – Master Freakin' Chief**

"Holy freakin' Mother of God in Heaven, its Master goddamn Chief!" Tucker yelled. He was right. What the hell was Master Chief doing in Blood Gulch? What could this empty barren valley possibly have that he wanted? Anyway, he was here…and we were confused as hell.

"Hello? Is anyone here?" Chief yelled.

"MASTER CHIEF!" Tucker yelled as he ran toward the SPARTAN warrior.

"Uh…who are you?" Chief asked.

"Um…I'm Private Lavernius Tucker of the Blue army! I have been stuck in this goddamn canyon with these retards for five freakin years. You are here to save me." Caboose and I walked up to Chief as well.

"Is he serious?" Chief asked.

"Unfortunately yes Chief. We have been stuck in this canyon, fighting the reds, for 5 years." I said.

"The Reds? Who are the Reds?" Chief asked.

"Uh, duh dude. They're the enemy. You know, Red vs. Blue. We have been told to destroy the Reds at all costs." Tucker's cries of convincing had not taken effect. Chief stood dumbstruck like he was just told something impossible. "Uh…what are you staring at?"

"I…uh…you see…um…hold on one second." Chief touched the side of his helmet. "Cortana, can you-"

"Cortana's here, AWESOME!" Tucker said.

"Yeah, she's here. I need to ask her something, so ple-"

"Sorry, I just wanted to say she's hot!"

"TUCKER!" I yelled. "Stop being a dick!"

"Thank you." Chief said to me. He turned and called Cortana again. "Cortana, is there any record of an operation on Blood Gulch in the last 5 years?" Cortana's voice emitted from Chief's helmet.

"Chief, I found a file that was confiscated from Vic when we found him. It mentions Blood Gulch as the main base of the operation." She said.

"Yeah!" I yelled. "Vic was working as Blue and Red command. We stopped talking to him, cause he's an ass."

"He was really mean." Caboose said. "He didn't help at all either. He helped O'Malley."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Chief yelled. "Can someone just explain to me just what the hell you guys are doing here?"

"Okay." I said. "Just let me radio Red team to get over here." Chief nodded and I got on the radio waves and looked for Donut.

"Donut! Are you there?" I asked.

"Yeah Church, whaddya need?" Dount replied.

"Donut; get Grif, Sarge, and Simmons over to the middle of the canyon now! I'll explain later." Donut agreed and went to get the rest of the red squad. When they arrived…let me tell you, Sarge's reaction was priceless.

"What in tarnation is going on here that you had to interrupt my game of Grifball? What is this ship doing here? Who is th-" When Sarge recognized Master Chief, hell, I thought he was going to faint himself.

"Mas…Mas…Mas…oh my god Grif, pinch me! Ow! Dammit Grif!"

"What? You asked me to." Sarge ignored his least liked soldier and asked what was going on. I started my story for Chief.

I started with Tex's arrival in Blood Gulch and my death. Oh, he ate that up. I told him about O'Malley and the reign of terror that we stopped because of him. Then there were the aliens, Sister, Doc, the Freelancer program, and everything else. I basically retold everything that had happened in Blood Gulch, bit by bit. I never thought I'd talk that long. I also didn't think that anyone in the canyon could be silent for 3 goddamn minutes let alone 15! When I was done…well…

Chief was speechless. He just stared at us for a while. After about two minutes of silence, he finally spoke up.

"Okay, let me get this straight. You guys have been here for five years. After the first 3, a computer virus named O'Malley, who came from your friends Tex's AI enhancement, showed up. This was however, after Church and Tex died, became ghosts, and possessed a bunch of robots. Then, O'Malley began to infect people and eventually drove you to a place where a bomb went off that threw all of you but Church 800 years into the future, and Church into the past. Church waited for 1000 years while a computer named Gary assembled a time machine that he could use to get back here. Then, an alien came along telling you about a weird prophecy. This alien eventually impregnated Tucker with a weird alien baby, which he had and named Junior. After this, O'Malley returned and formed alliances with another mercenary named Wyoming, the aliens, and a Spanish speaking robot named Lopez that Sarge had built. This eventually led to the group trying to escape on a pelican, but a talking bomb named Andy intervened and killed them all, including the AI for a talking tank named Sheila who was housed on the pelican. And all the while, the Red team and the Blue team have been enemies and were constantly fighting each other. However, while Sarge was serious about the war, the Blue team wasn't. And to tie it all together, you're only contact with the outside world has been with a man you only know as Vic, and later his however many greats grandson Vic Jr. And both Vics have been command for both teams, without you knowing? Have I got that about right?" I looked around at everyone else. Their silence confirmed that I hadn't forgotten anything.

"Yeah, pretty much." I said. Cortana suddenly spoke up again.

"Did you only get your support from Vic, or did he send you here as well?" she asked me. I thought for a moment.

"No he sent us here as well…come to think of it, Vic was the only connection to UNSC that we had for the last five years. After a few operations other than here, Vic found us and sent us here. I didn't argue cause I would rather be here than put my life in danger the way Chief has. No offense."

"Uh…none taken…" he responded. Cortana spoke again.

"Well…I have some bad news for you guys." I couldn't believe it. What the hell could possibly be worse than Vic's non-existent help and hollow encouragements like 'try to win' or 'stay alive'?

"Well, Vic's real name was Victor Envitro. He was an ex-con who somehow managed to sneak into the UNSC base. He set up shop and lived there for years. He apparently was affected by the time bomb the same as you were and was blown into the future. However he stayed in his control room. He tricked you guys into coming here. We recently found him in a secret room in UNSC command on the _Cairo_ space station. He had numerous files and pictures of this canyon. We decided to find this place, as he had your character files and service records. He was lying to you. There is no war between Red or Blue soldiers. You are both on the same team." This was not what we wanted to hear. I always knew there was something wrong with Vic, but nothing this serious. Tucker was the first to respond.

"Gee, Vic was a liar, big fucking surprise. Next you're going to tell us that Caboose is dumb as a post, News-Flash!" he said.

"Hey…I am not as dumb as a post." Caboose said. "Those sticky papers have some important information on them! Tucker uses them all the time."

"Those are post-it notes Caboose." Donut added.

"Ohhhhhh. Okay…I don't get it." He replied.

"Shut your yapper Caboose! This is serious business!" Sarge yelled. He turned back to Master Chief. "Do you need anything sir? I can shut these men up for you. Here, watch." Sarge quickly smacked Grif with the butt of his shotgun.

"OW! Jeez, Sarge. What was that for?"

"Shut up Grif!"

"Yeah Grif shut up!"

"You too Simmons!"

"Yes sir! Shutting up sir!" My god, he even kisses up when Sarge insults him! He's lucky Chief's here; otherwise I'd kill him myself.

"Can you guys shut up please!" I yelled. "I think we should listen to the professional here. Chief and Cortana have fought the Covenant freakin armada! I think they know more about the situation they you do! So shut up before I blast some rounds in your asses!"

"Bow-chicka-Wow-Wow!"

"TUCKER!"


	3. Semper Fi, Bitch!

**Episode 103 – Semper Fi, Bitch!**

Master Chief stood mouth agape at our story. He could hardly believe anything we had told him. But I couldn't care less if he understands us. I just hope that he gets us the HELL OUT OF THIS CANYON!

"Okay, now that we have your story straight, I'll tell you ours." Chief said.

"You heard him men!" Sarge said. "Shut your yaps and listen up!"

"Gee, like we didn't want to already." Grif replied. Chief started his story.

"All right, first off. You were not thrown 800 years into the future. It has only been 20 years since Vic escaped UNSC Prison. The bomb that Sarge implanted in Church was not powerful enough to create a time rift that powerful. However, it did throw Church over 1000 years into the past as well." Chief elaborated.

"Well that's just great!" I yelled. Chief gave me a look of annoyance, so I shut up.

"Anyway, the war has been over for some time now. The Elites have overtaken the Covenant, the Prophets are dead, and the Brutes have been either exiled or executed. The Arbiter has been instated as Ruler of the Elites and they are living peacefully on their home planet. It was only after that when we discovered Vic living in the bowels of the _Cairo_ space station using an old computer terminal to communicate with you. At first we thought that the pictures and data logs he was in possession of were part of a really weird videogame. Then we found each of your service records with him. So, we arrested him and began to search for you guys."

"Wait a gosh-darn minute!" Sarge interjected. "I remember going to meet with Vic two years ago. Vic sent me a pelican and we went to Red Command."

"Yes, we know that. All we can say about that is that Vic is one hell of a con artist. He somehow convinced a few UNSC guards to masquerade as the board you met with. Didn't you find anything strange about the meeting?" Chief asked.

"Well, we did have to go down a few floor hatches…then there was the blindfold they had on me." Jesus Christ! Why hadn't he mentioned this before!? God damn it! Who the hell trained these guys!?

"So…if the war is over…and you are here…I don't get it." Caboose said.

"WE GET TO GO HOME!!" Tucker yelled. It took me a moment to process this. It was true though. We were going home.

"Yes, but…" Cortana said. Oh, god no more! Please no more! "After hearing your story, I think we have to stop at UNSC base first." Oh thank god…for a moment I thought they were going to leave us here.

"First off," Chief began. "Using Flood technology, the UNSC have found a way to bring intact human bodies back to life. Since Church is currently a ghost I think that, using his corpse, we can revive him." I'll admit, I was dumbstruck.

"You can do that!? Holy Shit!" I yelled.

"Yes, as it turns out, we can. We can also restore and heal any injuries that you boys have sustained." Chief said.

"I'm here too!" Sister pointed out.

"Sorry, didn't see you there." Chief apologized. "Anyway, injuries or wounds like Caboose's missing toe and Grif and Simmons' mismatched body parts. You will all be totally human again and free to go home." My mouth was salivating. I would get a body again. "Also, there is the matter of the wreckage of that pelican…"

"Wait, what!?" I asked.

"Oh yes, I hadn't mentioned that yet." Chief said. "I'll have Cortana tell you." Chief flipped a switch on the back of his helmet and a hologram of Cortana was projected onto the ground. Tucker almost pounced on her, but Doc held him back.

"Hello, boys." She said. "The reason we're her is because we found Vic at the UNSC stronghold. However, the catalyst for his discovery was the discovery of a crashed Pelican drop ship in the area of another UNSC outpost referred to as Standoff." Cortana projected an image of Standoff on the ground. It looked a lot like this hell hole, but better, a whole hell of a lot better. Then, Cortana zoomed in on an image of a crashed Pelican next to a giant satellite dish a few miles from the two bases.

"What was salvaged from the wreckage?" I asked. Cortana projected images of the recovered items from the site.

"We found the bodies of two alien life forms. The smaller one, I can only assume, is Junior." She said. Tucker recognized the image.

"That's him! That's Junior! That's my son!" I still shuddered at the thought of Tucker's alien abomination. I refused to call it a child.

"Anyway," Cortana continued. "We also recovered the data of three AI programs saved in the ship's mainframe. We have yet to reactivate any of them, and we are still doing research on them." I could only assume that the three AI programs were Sheila, Gary, and…and…no it couldn't be. Andy was programmed to destroy him! O'MALLEY!"

"I think you should stop trying to reactivate the programs!" I yelled. "One of them could be O'Malley."

"Understood Pvt. Church, I will radio Command the first chance I get." Chief said.

"Was there anything else found?" Simmons asked.

"There was. We found two Spartan helmets on board. They were extremely damaged and one was completely useless. However, the other was a cybernetic head that held an AI program that identified itself as-" Sarge interrupted her.

"LOPEZ! Lopez survived Andy's explosion! Huzzah!" he yelled. There was one thing missing from the list that I really had hoped was found.

"Was there another body found onboard?" I asked. Chief walked over to me and placed his hand on my shoulder.

"I'm sorry Church, we didn't find anyone that matches Tex's description." He said. My head sank. "Don't worry though. That might mean that she is still alive. Plus, she was a ghost at the time of explosion. There is a very high possibility that she is alive, er…well…ghostly, I guess." I totally forgot about that. Tex had died in the same week that I had and become a ghost. I had forgotten that she was a robot as well as me. I had just become so accustomed to the body, that I forgot it was robotic.

"Well, what are we standing around here for?" Cortana said. "We gotta get to UNSC command to help you guys." We all shouted in unison in the affirmative. We all went back to our respective bases and collected our things. Chief also unearthed both mine and Tex's original bodies from their graves so they could repair us at the base. Finally, we boarded Chief's Pelican and flew away. We flew away…away from that GODDAMN BOX CANYON that had caused us so much grief. Good-bye Blood Gulch, good-bye and good riddance! 


	4. Regroup & Debrief

**Episode 104 – Regroup and Debrief**

The place we were sent to was the _Cairo_ Orbital Defense Platform. Chief came with us and gave us a tour of the platform. He led us to an area that he said was where we are going to be fixed up. There were a lot of scientists in the room, and a bunch of surgical tables. The head doctor came over and asked us who we were. When Chief told him…he smiled.

"It is so nice to have the soldiers of Blood Gulch here with us." He said. I could not believe that such a wrong statement was able to escape his mouth. He told us all to go to different tables and take our armor off. When we got to our respective tables, the scientists closed some curtains. I for one could not take off my armor, because I was a robot. Another scientist wheeled my corpse onto the table. It was amazing what the SPARTAN armor did to corpses. It actually preserves the bodies in a sort-of cryostasis. My body looked as good as it ever did. I was 27 when I died and I had medium length, spiky, black hair and (after lugging around that heavy as hell armor) was fairly muscular. The doctor told me to exit my robot form, which I did. It was fun being a spirit, I had always liked it, but I was psyched to get my body back.

"I'm going to infect your body with UNSC approved chemically controlled Flood spores that will revive your body, but keep it human. Your revived body will theoretically pull your soul back into it and you will be alive again." The doc said. Ah, modern medicine. No matter how stupid it sounds, it worked. As soon as he put the syringe in my arm I was suddenly lying on the table, gasping for air. I moved around a bit and sat up on the table.

"Wow, thanks doc." I said. "You are a hell of a lot better medic than DuFresne." It was weird using Doc's name, but I guess that's what the UNSC knew him by.

"You may experience some disorientation for a short while, but you will be perfectly fine soon enough." The Doc said. "Why don't you get up and try it out." I did. I pulled on the suit of SPARTAN armor the other doctor had brought in. It was my original armor and had been cleaned. I didn't put the helmet on; I didn't have any need for it. I walked out of the small medical space and walked over to Caboose's table. It was weird, in the five years I had spent with these idiots, I had no idea what they looked like. Caboose was younger than me, 22 at best, and had very short blond hair. His features were much like a child and his blue eyes looked so optimistic.

"Church! You're a real boy again!" he said.

"Yeah, I guess so." I said. "How's your toe."

"The doctor stuck me with a pointy tube that hurt…a lot. Then my toe was back! It was AWESOME!" There he goes again, with his childlike attitude.

"Well at least you didn't lose any blood this time." I said, recalling the time he was attacked by Tucker's abomination.

"Yeah! I'm Not Dizzy!" I chuckled. My attention was quickly caught by a nurse yelling the word 'pervert' in a high-pitched scream. What the hell could Tucker have done now? I ran out and followed the scream. Tucker was half-undressed and chasing a nurse around in circles. Tucker was a white male with light-brown hair, and the same muscular structure as me. I couldn't believe it, but he actually was wearing glasses. He never seemed like a guy who wore glasses.

"TUCKER!" I yelled. "What the hell are you doing!?"

"She told me to take my armor off, so I was."

"At any time did you say the phrase 'Bow-chicka-wow-wow'?"

"Yeah, of course I did. That's how I roll." Did he grow up near a toxic waste dump or something? Why was he so perverted, damn it!?

"Tucker, sit down, and let the nurse treat you. Do not act like yourself!" I yelled.

"Fine." He replied. "Congratulations on getting your body back, by the way."

"Thanks." I said before I walked away. Donut was my next stop. I was really anxious to see what he looked like. He was the only Red soldier that I liked and he didn't annoy me half as much as Simmons did. Donut was already fixed up and walking around. He was really young! My guess was nineteen years old. He had short blonde hair and a well kept physique. Well, at least we knew he was a guy. I even had my doubts about that for sometime.

"Hey Church, you got your body back!" he said.

"Yeah. How you feeling Donut?" I asked.

"I'm great! Never better!" he replied. I didn't want things to get awkward, seeing as he wasn't wearing a shirt, so I ended the conversation and walked off.

Doc and Sister were next. I still wanted to know how O'Malley infecting Doc for all that time had affected his brain. Doc and Sister were laying on two adjacent tables. Sister wasn't injured, so the doctor was done with her shortly. Sister was even younger than Donut. She had to be a high school dropout, eighteen at best! She had orange hair that had been tied into two pigtails and a few freckles dotted her young face.

"Hey Church!" she said. "Nice bod!" One word swirled through my mind. Slut.

"Yeah…I think I'll go check on Doc." I got away from Sister as fast as I could and went over to Doc's table. Doc was still lying down and the doctor was running some laser gadget over his head. He was about 24 years old, had short brown hair, and light 5 o'clock shadow.

"How you feeling Doc?" I asked.

"Oh, I'm fine." He replied. "I don't understand why I need this examination though."

"Doc, an evil computer virus was in control of you for months. You were constantly switching between his personality and yours." I explained. "That had to have done a number on your brain."

"He's right." The doctor chimed in.

"What do you mean?" Doc asked.

"Well, the Omega program seems to have messed with your central nervous system." He said "When he was in control of your body, he influenced it in a way that he had left imprints in your brain. I think that you may experience mood swings every so often, and one day you may develop Disassociative Identity Disorder." I understood that, but Doc looked up in confusion. Great, the team's medic who had been possessed by an evil computer virus didn't know the technical term for Multiple Personality Disorder. I shrugged it off and went over to the red team's area. Sarge was already standing outside the big area where Grif and Simmons were. Sarge was an older man (maybe in his 40s) with a few battle scars on his face and bleach white hair.

"Hey Sarge, how's it going?" I asked.

"Well, I was fixed up fairly quickly. However, Simmons 2.0 and Grif are in there getting help." He said. "They have to put them both on a large regimen of the Flood serum so their body parts could regenerate. They can simply reattach Simmons's body parts, but Grif will have to go through the horrible torture of regrowing his entire body structure. This hard road of agonizing pain will ultimately scar him internally for life, but give him a fixed body to live his traumatizing life in…so thing are going great!" Sarge's unrelenting hate of Grif never failed to amaze me. How one person could hate another person so much was unbelievable to me. My thoughts were interrupted by Master Chief touching my shoulder.

"Captain Church, Sergeant." He said as he nodded. I was surprised by his address of me. I was about to point it out, but he interrupted me. "That's right. Captain Flowers could not be revived, so you've been promoted." I couldn't help but feel relief that Flowers was dead. He didn't really help us that much. However, I didn't feel that good, considering that he overdosed on the drugs I gave him. "Since you two are the leaders of the two 'teams', I think I should show you the remains of the Pelican." That's right, I had almost forgotten. I wanted to see what was recovered. Chief turned around and Sarge and I followed him.

"First up, the aliens." Chief said. He pulled back a white sheet to reveal the bodies. They were burnt and damaged from Andy's explosion. Tucker's alien abomination, a.k.a. 'the Great Destroyer', sat on the right of the Green Alien. I didn't really care that they were dead, but since O'Malley was planning to infect Junior and takeover the Alien race, it seemed to balance out.

"The small one is Junior, I don't know who the big one is." I said. Chief explained who they really were.

"These two life forms are of the Covenant race." He said. "If they followed the religion you said they did, they had defected from the true Covenant religion and created their own. And as such, they would be treated as Heretics under the rule of the Prophets."

"So, they aren't really Covenant than." Sarge said.

"True." Chief replied. "Well, onto the next one then." Chief walked us over to another table with two SPARTAN helmets on it.

"Lopez's head!" Sarge yelled. He ran over to the green helmet and picked it up.

"If that is your cybernetic friend, I guess his body was destroyed on the pel-" I cut Chief off.

"No, he lost his body in the first bomb, the one that sent us into the future." Chief nodded and shrugged his shoulders. I guess he finally accepted that all our stories would be like this. "You can reactivate him. He's harmless. The only thing wrong with him is that he only speaks Spanish."

"The robot only speaks Spanish?" he asked. Before I could answer, he stopped me. Again, he just accepted our answer and didn't ask questions. At that moment Lopez clicked back on.

"Error…error…" he said in Spanish. "Where am I." After living in his body for a while I picked up Spanish and I guess that makes me translator for the group.

"Don't worry Lopez, you're safe." I said. "And as long as you are good, Sarge will build you a new body."

"Nonsense!" Sarge said. "I'll build him a body regardless!"

"Sarge, he tried to kill us on numerous occasions." I argued "He built a robot army with O'Malley and willingly participated in his plans!"

"I know…" Sarge sniffled a bit. "I'm so proud of him. I'm just happy we can hate Grif together again…" I refused to dignify that with a response. I walked over to the Wyoming helmet on the table. It had been badly damaged and scarred with ash and other debris. I ignored it and walked over to the other side of the room. There was a large computer against the wall and a bunch of scientists milled around it.

"Is this where they are researching the AI programs?" I asked to Chief.

"Yes." He replied "So far, they've discovered two of the AI's original storage spaces."

"Let me guess, one is a M808 Main Battle Tank and the other was a program that was distributed in the Freelancer program." I said, describing Sheila and Gary.

"Good guess." Chief said. "We have yet to discover anything about the third AI."

"Well, you can reactivate the Tank AI, that's Sheila." They obeyed me and began the reactivation process. Instead of reinstalling her into a tank, they decided to convert her to an AI program like Cortana that could be moved between different hardware. When she came online, she was projected onto a small holo-table not to far away.

"Hello, and thank you for using the M808 Main Battle-" she suddenly realized where she was. "Oh, Hello Church!" she announced. As a hologram, Sheila didn't look very different from Cortana. The only real differences were their voices, and the fact that Sheila was purple and Cortana was blue.

"Hey Sheila" I said. "Looks like you survived intact."

"I would like to say so, however my memory banks have been damaged and I can't remember some things from just before Andy exploded." She responded.

"Wait, you can remember that Andy exploded but not anything else leading up to that?" I asked.

"Yeah…weird functions are almost a necessity when you're built by the lowest bidder." Well, that explains that. I figured that I should leave her be and figure out what the third AI program.

"What are the specs on the third AI?" I asked Chief.

"We have yet to find any relevant information in the AI's code. It seems to have been extremely damaged in the explosion." I took solace in that. If it was O'Malley, than he had been hurt badly. Suddenly the computer screen in front of us started blinking red.

"What is that!?" I yelled. One of the technicians at the screen answered me.

"We set an alarm on the third AI. It's set to alert us if there is any activity in it's program code. We think it's trying to activate itself." I was about to yell again when the AI came online. I was caught off guard by the heavy Brooklyn accent that suddenly filled the room.

"What's up ya dirty Shisno?" the voice said.

"ANDY!?"


	5. The Plot Thickens

**Episode 105 – The Plot Thickens**

_--Sorry this took so long. And yes, there is more drama in this one than the others. It was necessary. Please Enjoy and Review.--_

"How the hell did you even survive the explosion?" I yelled at the massive computer in front of him. I was of course talking to the rude AI program that had just revealed himself to have survived the explosion of Tex's Pelican.

"Oh that? That was easy." Andy replied. "Tex added a program to my internal hard drive that transferred my AI into the computer closest to me when I went off. She said she might need me as a translator after I exploded. You're freakin lucky those Recovery Agents found me. Otherwise, you guys would be screwed."

"We don't need you that bad." I replied.

"Aw shut up Shisno." Andy said under his breath.

"Um, if I may ask." Chief said. "What is a Shisno?"

"You don't want to know." I responded.

--

Meanwhile, somewhere unknown, a man stirred. He had been laying there for some time. He couldn't remember why he was there. He slowly raised his head and looked out around the area in front of him. The giant fan still spun at its slow pace. His memories flooded back to him. O'Malley, Lopez, the flag. Ah, the flag. It was so flappy! The man suddenly wondered where everybody else was. He remembered that the Red and Blue squads were at the base before he was knocked out. He remembered Tucker, whose sword had struck him. He remembered Tex, whose gun had shot Lopez. Then he remembered Gary, the giant computer, the liar. Suddenly, a voice startled the man.

"Hello?" the voice asked. It sounded like an older model computer's voice program. "Hello? Are you there Zealot?"

"I'm here oh mechanized one! Are you in contact with the flag?"

"No, you moron. I am speaking to you through the speakers in your helmet." The voice responded.

"Oh, okay. Wait, I recognize your voice. Gary is that you?" the Zealot asked.

"Well, well. I see you have become much more reasonable during your absence. You even remembered my name."

"Well, I'm not crazy. I'm just religious."

"Are you crazy enough to help me?"

"What do you need help with Gary?"

"We have a ghost that needs reattachment."

--

"I'm guessing this is the ship that's going to take us home?" I asked Chief.

"You bet. We've uploaded Sheila and Andy's AI programs into the mainframe of the ship. You may deactivate them or store them in your armor if you wish at anytime." I shuddered to think what damage coupling my mind with either Andy's or Sheila's would cause. Hell, Doc was already on the brink of psychosis after sharing his mind with O'Malley for so long.

We had been on the Cairo for two weeks now. Grif and Simmons were completely fixed up and happy to be alive, just like the rest of us. The UNSC had created a new Cyborg body for Lopez. And guess what? It speaks English! Yes, no more Spanish to English dictionaries for us!

Chief called all of us to the air hanger where our transport awaited. It was a pristine Pelican dropship, much like the one that Chief had brought us here on. Caboose came up next to me.

"Are we going home?" he asked. I nodded.

"Yeah Caboose, we're going home." A smile slid across the kid's face. He seemed much happier since we have been on the _Cairo_. It's probably because he doesn't have to think for himself, the docs have been supervising us the whole time.

"Yo, Church!" Tucker yelled behind us. "Is this the thing that's taking us home?"

"Yeah." I replied. "Don't expect hot stewardesses that you can sexually harass."

"Ah, man. Ruin my fun." He grieved. I just laughed. Sarge came up behind me after Tucker and Caboose boarded.

"Alright Men! All Aboard!" he said. There was a maroon blur that ran in front of me that I can only assume was Simmons running to the ship. Grif reluctantly walked up to Sarge and me.

"Are we really going home?! Is it really over?!" he asked.

"That's right Grif." Sarge replied. "I'll always cherish our times together."

"Are you serious Sarge?" Grif asked.

"What? Oh, Grif, no I was talking to Lopez over there." Sarge pointed over in Lopez's direction at the entrance of the hanger, then turned back to Grif. "I hope you burn in the lowest hottest circle of hell, Grif. Well see ya." Sarge walked onto the Pelican and Grif sighed as he walked on as well. Lopez walked up to me.

"Hola Lopez!" I said jokingly. "Habla ingles o espanol?"

"Ha, ha, very funny Church. You know I can speak English now."

"I know, but it's still fun." I patted Lopez on the back and he walked into the Pelican as well. Doc and Sister walked in without words, both with their arms around each other's back. It's amazing how much Doc has changed Sister. She has significantly changed from a full-blown slut to only a small-time slut with a boyfriend. Donut boarded after them. He seemed very tired when I saw him.

I felt Chief's hand tap me on the shoulder. I turned around to face him. He actually saluted me when I met eye-to-visor with him. I tried my best to replicate it, but I hadn't done it in a very long time.

"Good luck Cpt. Church." He said.

"Thanks for your help Master Chief." I replied. There was an ere of respect and admiration that suddenly came over me, and I felt so much better about myself. I felt…normal again. After Chief's and mine's little moment, I turned and boarded the ship myself. I walked past my fellow soldiers and sat in the driver's seat in the front. Sheila's voice suddenly came over the loudspeakers.

"Are we ready for takeoff." She asked me.

"Yes, Sheila. Yes we are." I replied.

"Auto pilot enabled. Co-ordinates for destinations uploaded. Preparing for takeoff." She explained. I felt the engines click on and the rockets on the back fire up. We rose in the air in the hanger and took off.

Ten minutes passed. The flight was smooth. My comrades in the back had all fallen asleep. The past week had been very tiring on them, they deserved a rest. I wanted to go to sleep as well, but Sheila's voice kept me awake. She kept talking, even if I didn't want her to. But, her voice was not the voice I wanted to hear. In my dazed state, I found my self drifting into a state of pseudo-unconsciousness, and I heard her voice again. Even when she was insulting me, she still sounded elegant. Tex's voice echoed in my mind as I drifted off to sleep.

--

A half-hour later, I was awoken by a loud noise. I looked around the cabin and noticed a red light flashing around and around.

"Shiela!" I yelled "Shiela! What the Hell is going on!?" Shiela's voice came over the intercom. Andy, who had been offline since we uploaded his AI program, accompanied her.

"Church! Something is trying to overtake the ship!" Shiela yelled.

"Yeah!" Andy added. "There's another AI hidden in this ship's programming! We're trying to fight it off, but it's hacking the engine core! It's trying to crash the ship!" Suddenly, white noise overtook the speakers. I turned my attention to my friends in the back. I ran out the door of the cabin and burst into the back, where my comrades were all clutching onto the walls, braced for impact. No one had the chance to speak before an ominous voice overtook the loudspeakers, replacing the white noise. I recognized the voice.

"Hello Blood Gulch Squad. You Dirty Bunch of Shisnos." The voice said. Gary, or should I say Gamma, he must have hacked into our system before we left the _Cairo_.

"Gary! What do you wan-" I was cut off by the ship suddenly jolting and knocking me to the floor. The lights went black and the screams of my friends could be heard. The ship was falling. We were going to crash. I was suddenly surprised by an unexpected voice yelling and unexpected warning.

"Everybody brace for impact!" I heard Tucker yell. Never before had I heard him concerned about the safety of others. I, on the other hand, yelled the first thing that came to my mind.

"TEX!!" I yelled. And then we crashed.


	6. Hall of the Slain

**Episode 106 – Hall of the Slain**

_--Here's a long awaited chapter. I apoligize for the wait and the shortness of the chapter, but the length was necessary. I'm thinking of incorporating elements of the RvB: Reconstruction series into this yarn, but I'm also hesitant. Please review. I appreciate criticism and suggestions. Enjoy--_

"Ugh...where am I? What happened?" I said as I pushed myself up off the floor of the crashed pelican. I looked around the cabin. My friends were…wait, did I think friends? Why would I use the word friends to describe these people? Well, whatever. My…friends…were all unconscious on the floor. There was a small fire on the wall down the room that I ignored. I walked back to the front cabin. The windshield was destroyed but I could see outside. There was a giant rock wall in front of me. I slammed on the control panel and yelled out for Sheila.

"SHEILA!" I yelled. "Sheila are you still there!?" The speakers clicked on and white noise took over. Then, Sheila's voice came on. It was distorted at first, but it fixed itself after a second.

"h…ello…chu…rch?" she garbled "Church, is that you?" she asked.

"Sheila! What just happened?" I yelled.

"What? Oh, sorry. Well, Gamma somehow hacked into our system. He came online and suppressed Andy and mine's programming and crashed the ship."

"Is he still in the system?" I asked.

"System's check says no. His programming has evacuated the system."

"Damn it! Okay, do you have a lock on where we are?"

"My GPS system was damaged in the crash, but from what I can piece together, we've landed at another military outpost."

"Any UNSC outpost tag or location name?" I asked.

"The only other data I can recover is a single word."

"Well, what are you waiting for? What is it?" I half-ignored the word as she said it and braced my back against the front seat. Then I kicked with all my might at the window in front of me. It shattered into bits and almost sliced me a few times. So, I reached over for my helmet, which I had taken with me for sentimentality, and pulled it on for safety. I reached up into the air and grasped onto the twisted shrapnel that once was the window frame. Staring out at the green landscape of the area was a bit breathtaking. There was a massive wall on the one side of the area that blocked us off from anything else. A river ran through this artificial canyon, but I was happy to see a lake to the right. Two bases stood on either side.

As beautiful as the area was, there was something similar about it. Something hauntingly familiar that I really…really…hated.

"Can you repeat that Sheila?" I asked.

"I said, the military tag for this place is Outpost 17-B" she replied. "Otherwise known as Valhalla."

"Valhalla?" For some reason my knowledge of Norse mythology from college kicked in. "Hall of the Slain? May as well be named…" I gasped. I hated the next word that I was about to say more than anything else in the world, but I said it anyway. "…Blood Gulch."

--

"Where are we Gary?" the Zealot asked the small AI program in his helmet. Gamma had led the Zealot from Omega's old base to a barren outpost, miles away.

"According to the records, this area is an abandoned military outpost used during the first years of the Red and Blue civil war. It is officially named Outpost 12-F, but the troops gave it the nickname 'Snowbound'."

"Why are we here?" the Zealot inquired as he reached the empty base in front of him. He could tell no one had been here for a while. The electronics and hardware in the base had been badly damaged and left to rot. There was no real reason for it to be there anymore, but no one had moved it.

"I told you," Gamma replied. "We have a ghost that needs reattachment."

"I understood that, but what does that mean?"

"Do you remember Tex?"

"You mean that girl soldier from a while back?"

"Exactly. After a little battle at Blood Gulch, my employer has been rendered effectively useless without our help. We need to help him. But, to do that, we need Tex."

"Well, where's Tex?" The Zealot's question was timed perfectly. As soon as he walked around the glass wall that stood behind the pile of useless machinery, he saw it. Tex's jet black suit of armor sat strapped to a standing operation table in front of them. She made not a sound as she lay there. She didn't seem to be asleep, but she wasn't dead either. She was just there.

Suddenly, a sinister voice broke the silence. A wicked crescendo of evil voice filled the air and sent a cold shot up the Zealot's spine.

"Well, it's about damn time you got back!" said the voice. The Zealot realized that it was emanating from Tex's helmet.

"Calm down, boss." Gamma replied. "I brought your host."

"Host?" The Zealot asked. "What do you mean host-ugh!" The Zealot was caught with a feeling that he could only equate to a punch to the temple. Once his balance was regained, the dizziness was replaced with that same voice.

"I hope this one can handle me in his mind." The voice said.

"Don't worry, you've had previous experience with this one. You remember the Zealot don't you?"

"That flag worshipping buffoon? Why did you choose him?"

"I thought his head couldn't get anymore screwed up than it already was."

"Hey!" The Zealot objected to the two voices in his mind.

"Shut Up!" they both replied. The Zealot stayed quiet.

"Now that I have a working body, with an attached soul, we must find Tex's wondering ghost. She could be anywhere by now" the voice replied.

"Um…excuse me?" the Zealot asked the voices.

"What!?" They asked back.

"Um…what's going on?"

"Ugh…Well, do you remember this voice you crazy religious buffoon."

"There's only one guy I know who still says buffoon and that's…" the Zealot gulped. His last experience with the speaker of the voice was not exactly a pleasant one. "Hello, O'Malley." He said.

"That's Master Omega to you." An evil laugh was let out that echoed throughout the empty outpost.


	7. Setbacks YAY!

**Episode 107 – Setbacks…YAY!**

We unloaded our gear from the pelican as soon as we were able to open the loading ramp. It took us having to use a spare Spartan Laser that we found in the emergency supplies storage under the floor. Everything else was, to some extent, damaged. Our personal effects had survived the crash, but we lost some of the weapons that were being stored onboard. I didn't even know why there were weapons onboard. Everyone denied having smuggled them, but Sarge's defense seemed shaky.

"What weapons?" he asked me upon questioning.

"Well," I started. "There are five Battle Rifles, six Assault Rifles, a crate of pistols, two Sniper Rifles, and a goddamn Rocket Launcher shoved in the cargo bay!"

"I don't know what you're talking about." He replied. I decided not to question the matter any further. I didn't think I would win any argument that would take place between Sarge and myself.

Once we were outside of the pelican we inspected the area. It seemed like I was the only one in this little squad that had any military education, since I was the only one actually recognizing the architecture of the bases.

"From what I can see, that wall is of Forerunner architecture. So are the bases on either side." I explained.

"What the hell is a Forerunner?" Tucker asked. Of course it was him who was oblivious as to the race that basically started the Halo Wars.

"You know what Tucker…" I sighed. "Just go with Doc and Sister and scope out a base for us to stay in." They grudgingly went off without another word towards the base closest to the water.

"Where are we?" Grif asked.

"I wonder why we're here." Simmons asked.

"Don't start that up again!" Grif replied. I ignored the duo and turned toward Sarge, who was giving Lopez a tune-up. Lopez was generally unharmed during the crash. We were all worried about his speech component though. We just didn't want Sarge getting his hands on it; none of us wanted to have to learn Spanish.

"Sarge, I'll need yours and Lopez's help when you're done over there."

"I don't take your orders you dirty ship crashing blue!" Oh great, he hates me again. Fantastic!

"Listen, when you're done with Lopez, see if you can get a radio signal anywhere."

"I was thinking of that before you said anything! I don't take you orders! Or didn't you hear me?"

"Alright; first of all, I outrank you now. You're a Sergeant and I'm a Captain. Second, I didn't crash the damn ship, Gary did! Thirdly, the Red and Blue Civil War never existed! Vic played us against each other! We are on the SAME team!" I walked away after that. I swear I heard Sarge whisper something along the lines of 'dirty blue' as I left, but I ignored it. I walked to Donut next.

"Donut, take Simmons and Grif to that other base and check it out. We may be here for a while."

"You got it Captain Church." He said as he saluted me. That upped my self-esteem a bit.

"What do you want me to do Church?" Caboose asked as I passed him on my way back to the Pelican.

"Umm…" I stammered. "You know what, Caboose, what was your rank again?"

"I think I'm still a private."

"Yeah well, you're a Lieutenent now. There, you outrank everyone but me now."

"Really!? Does that mean I get to boss people around!?"

"Whatever, I don't fucking care."

"YAY!" he yelled giddily.

"Now, follow me. I have a gift for you." We both walked up the ramp back into the destroyed Pelican. I never took Sheila or Gary out of the ship's mainframe. They could be helpful. I was taking Caboose because I remembered the old stories Tex told me about the Freelancers. She said that one of the agents went insane because he had more than one AI in his mind at once. Ah…Tex. I shook my head as thoughts of her entered my mind again, dispelling them for at least a little while longer.

"Andy! Sheila! You still in there?" I asked as I tapped on the control panel in the cockpit.

"Hey stop that tappin!" Andy yelled. "I'm still getting used to this moveable AI thing and that tapping sounds like explosions to me!"

"Crybaby." Sheila replied.

"Whadjusay Tank-Girl!?"

"Oh, please, tell me you two aren't fighting too?"

"Sorry Church, you wouldn't believe how big of a jerk this guy is." I hesitated to strike up an argument. It wasn't because I thought I wouldn't win, it just wasn't worth it.

"Whatever. Anyway, I want both of you to transfer to portable drives. We're taking you with us."

"Oh, oh oh!" Caboose interrupted. "I call Sheila, I call Sheila!" I chuckled at his willingness to store Sheila in his mind. Then again, he did harbor Omega for about a year, so he must have some useful experience.

"Give us a second Church." I waited for Sheila to finish for me to take out the two hard drives. I tossed the one with Sheila's programming to Caboose and showed him where to put it on his helmet. He was overjoyed when he heard her voice in his mind. Seeing as how I couldn't really trust anyone else with an AI (not even Donut), I put Andy in my helmet. That did not thrill me.

"Great, I gotta share your head!?" were the first words he spoke in my brain.

"Believe me, I don't like it either."

--

"Guys, where are we?" the Zealot asked his comrades in his head.

"Shut up you buffoon! You need to take out that soldier so we can steal that Pelican on the landing pad and find out where Tex's spirit has gone, providing she hasn't passed on completely."

"You said that already, but where are we?"

"Outpost 09-D, Rat's Nest." Said Gary. "It's one of the last manned SPARTAN Outposts on Earth. We just need to incapacitate that soldier to get his activation key for the Pelican."

"You see? Was that so hard? If you two just kept me in the loop then-"

"Oh just kill the bastard!" O'Malley yelled.

"Fine." The Zealot replied reluctantly. He pulled out the shotgun O'Malley and Gary had supplied him with and slowly tiptoed toward the UNSC soldier guarding the Pelican. The Zealot poked the soldier on his shoulder. As he turned around, the soldier was met with the sight of a shotgun in his face.

"Flag forgive me!" the Zealot praised before pulling the trigger. He was confronted with the sight of the pink mist his old comrades had told him about when the gun went off.

"Hurry you fool! Get the key off his belt and get in the damn bird before his buddies come running!" the Zealot did just that.

"Put my programming in the drive ports." Gary told the Zealot as he got in the pilot's seat. "I can fly one of these things better than either of you can. Trust me."

--

There was sand everywhere. That was all she could see. The Ruins stood before her. From the training she remembered, the best guess she had of where she was had to be somewhere on the Ark. The sandy environment matched that from the Battle of Installation 00 and the Ruins themselves seem to be the oldest of Forerunner architecture. She just hoped she could find a suitable host somewhere. She knew they were hot on her trail. They had her body, but she had escaped before Omega could kill her permanently. Tex ran off into the sands.


	8. The Misadventures of Three Idiots

**Episode 108 – The Misadventures of Three Idiots**

"You said you could fly this thing!" O'Malley yelled at Gary. The Pelican that the trio had hijacked was clumsily riding through space.

"Listen," Gary pleaded from the Pelican's dashboard. "I said I had more experience flying one of these things. Who was the one that was piloting the ship during Tex's escape from Blood Gulch? Me. Who crashed the Red and Blue teams in the middle of nowhere where no one could find them? Me. I suggest that you two shut up while I pilot this thing!"

"O'Malley, why don't you go easy on Gary? He's doing what he can." The Zealot suggested to the voices in his head.

"Zealot, what have I told you about thinking…and caring…and talking?"

"Fine." The Zealot responded. "Can I at least ask where we are going?"

"Ugh…" O'Malley groaned. "Alright, you already know that we're looking for Tex. So, I'll tell you how we are going to do it. First, we go to the _Cairo _space station and steal some of that new military controlled Flood spore serum they've been advertising. Then, Mr. Macintosh over here is going to take us back to that Snowbound Outpost and we are going to revive Tex. Then we can use her for our own nefarious purposes! AHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

"And what would those purposes be?" O'Malley fell silent and refused to reveal any more.

"We still have a few hours until we reach the _Cairo. _Why don't you go to sleep Zealot?" Gary suggested.

"But I don't feel sleepy-" The Zealot was forced to sleep as O'Malley overtook his suit's systems and activated the hibernation function.

"Oh, thank god. I thought he would never shut up. I love these suits, I should use that function more often."

--

"-at all" the Zealot continued as he awoke from the induced hibernation. "Hey! You used the cryo-sleep in my MJOLNIR armor didn't you?"

"I didn't NOT use it." O'Malley replied. The Zealot groaned.

"We don't have time for arguments!" Gary interjected. "We've arrived at the _Cairo._" The Zealot looked up at the defense platform and was amazed. He didn't think it would be that big. He had never ventured very far from Earth. Then those Red and Blue soldiers blew him to another planet entirely after they detonated that bomb. Now he was staring at the most magnificent structure he had ever laid eyes on…other than the flag of course, the majestic flag and its flappiness.

"Okay, what's the plan?" he asked.

"We need to get in there and steal some of those drugs! I thought I explained this to you?"

"I know, but how are we going to get in there?" The intercom clicked on with the hiss of white noise. Then a voice overtook the waves.

"Whiskey 32 this is Cairo Dock Pad what is your business in UNSC space?"

"Give me the microphone you fool!" The Zealot pressed the radio button and leaned closer to allow O'Malley to speak into it. "Cairo Dock this is Whiskey 32, just returning from a reconnaissance mission. Sergeant Hernandez allowed us the use of this transport. Ours was totaled in a crash."

"Who's Sergeant Hernandez?" The Zealot asked O'Malley.

"Well, according to the access card you stole, he's the guard you beheaded with your boomstick."

"You have clearance to land Whiskey 32, opening docking doors now." The massive metal doors of the docking station began to slide open and the Zealot stared in awe. Gary moved the Pelican into the docking bay. Two landing officials waved him in as he navigated to a landing. The landing officials greeted the Zealot as he stepped out from the loading ramp.

"There's only one of you?" the one on the left said.

"Uh…yeah. That was my AI talking over the radio." The Zealot replied.

"You've brought an AI? You'll need clearance for that." The one on the right said.

"Clearance? Why would I need clearance? You guys gave me this thing!"

"What are you doing?" O'Malley said to the Zealot. "They'll search your AI slots if you give them reason to! I can't let the UNSC find me! It will foil all my plans!"

"Uh…how do I get clearance?" the Zealot asked reluctantly.

"Supply your AI's codename and we'll supply you with a clearance code useable on this platform."

"Oh good, I'll get to use my pseudonym AI profile! I've been working on this thing for years! Tell them that my codename is Guilty Tangent!"

"Guilty Tangent." The Zealot told the landing technicians.

"We'll generate you a clearance code in a minute, be right back." The technicians walked away to retrieve the code. Gary chimed in again after being silent for he past minute.

"Guilty Tangent? Really? That's your fake name?"

"What? It's perfectly legit. The data will check out and I can use it for you to get around this ship's mainframe as well."

"I know, but Guilty Tangent? It's just a combination of the names Guilty Spark and Penitent Tangent, the monitors of two of the Halo rings. You read about them in the accounts of the Halo wars."

"So I remembered two names, it's not that hard."

"Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if your clearance code was-"

"3432401 is your clearance code sir. Please follow us and we'll lead you to the crew quarters." The Zealot could hear Gary laughing while O'Malley argued his position over the fake name as they left the loading bay.

--

The Zealot waited until the guards left their posts for the night for the trio's little searching expedition to the _Cairo_'s medical bay. He had already uploaded Gary into the computer mainframe of the platform and he was broadcasting through a secure radio line to the Zealot's helmet.

"Take a left at the next hallway." Gary said to him. "The medical lab is down that way." The metal doors slid open as the Zealot approached them. The room was empty as the scientists had left for the night. The Zealot ran over to the closest medical drawer to the door and began rummaging. He threw out syringes. styptic, and bandages looking for what O'Malley told him to find.

"There it is! The green one!" O'Malley yelled.

"No, that's flu vaccine." Gary countered.

"Oh, well what about that one? The red one?"

"Blood samples."

"The blue one?"

"Cold medicine."

"Ugh, well take all of them! We'll figure them out later."

"How about this one?" the Zealot asked, holding up a tan-colored vial. "It says 'Inferi redivivus UNSC vaccine'."

"That would be it." Gary replied. "Grab it and some syringes and let's-"

"Hello, Is anyone there?" a voice suddenly echoed in the lab.

"Blast!" O'Malley yelled to the Zealot. "Hide you fool!" The Zealot lept under the medical table.

"You moron!" Gary said. "He'll see you there! Stand up! Give me a minute, I'll work something out." The Zealot obeyed and stood back up.

A flashlight moved its sights around the lab. The Zealot acted non-chalant as the guard approached him. The Zealot saw that he was a very tall man, almost seven feet. He had the same type of MJOLNIR armor as him, only in green. The flashlight was part of the armor, a function the Zealot didn't know came with MJOLNIR armor.

"Who are you? I don't recognize that armor." The man asked the Zealot.

"Well?' O'Malley whispered to him. "Make something up."

"Um…Pvt. Zea Lot sir! I was put on last minute guard watch for the Med Lab."

"And you thought my fake name was bad." The Zealot could hear Gary laughing from the secure channel.

"I haven't heard of you before. You with Kurt's squad?"

"Uh…yeah."

"Okay," The man said. He held out his hand to the Zealot. "Master Chief Petty Officer John-117." The Zealot took Master Chief's hand and shook.

"Master Chief…the hero of the Halo Wars?" The Zealot asked in astonishment.

"Yeah, I guess that would be me. Well, I'll leave you to your post. Try not to touch anything in here. That Flood serum they got stored in here is really volitile. Having it interact with any other chamicals might be dangerous."

"Yes Sir!" The Zealot said with a salute. Chief saluted back and walked away, reholstering his sidearm and letting his flashlight move away from the Zealot. He stood there in amazement, frozen after his meeting with the Chief. "That was awesome." He muttered.

"Sorry to interrupt, but can we get out of here now!?" O'Malley yelled in the Zealot's ear.

"Oh, yeah. I guess we should leave before Chief checks with Kurt." Gary chimed in again.

"I doctored the guard lists. Pvt. Zea Lot was assigned to the medical labs tonight. That should buy us some time." The Zealot ran anyway.

The Zealot ran as fast as he could, backtracking through the hallways. He picked up Gary's programming from the AI ports in the control room of the flight deck and then hijacked another Pelican. Luckily there were no guards, so there was no need for another execution. The Zealot took off in his stolen Pelican and tried to rest as O'Malley and Gray rambled in his head.


	9. We Put The Laughter in Slaughter!

**Episode 109 – We Put the Laughter in Slaughter!**

"I can't believe we are stuck here." I said to Caboose as he sit next to me on the wreckage of our Pelican. He'd been spending a lot of time with me lately. Maybe it was because of the promotion I gave him last week. We tried to stay away from the rest of these idiots as much as possible.

"Me either. I'm just happy you're here Sheila." He replied. He and Sheila had become fast friends once their minds had molded together. Mine and Andy's relationship, however, was not as good.

"Why did you guys take me?" he asked from inside my helmet. "You didn't need me for anything, and I hate every single one of you morons."

"We had to take you." I said. "No one at the UNSC could put up with you."

"That's a lie!"

"What are those guys doing?" Sheila asked.

"I think they're trying to play Grifball." I told her. "That's about all they can do."

"Where are Doc and Sister?"

"Blue base. Three guesses what they're doing."

"What about Tucker, I don't see him anywhere." She was right. I was watching Sarge and Simmons chase Grif around with a Gravity Hammer they had found in Red Base. However, I couldn't see Tucker anywhere.

"Yeah, where is he?" Caboose asked. I got up to look around. Caboose followed me, of course. He's like a freakin' lapdog, not that I'm complaining. We walked over to Blue base, near the lake. There was Tucker standing in the water, looking up at the sun.

"What are you doing Tucker?" I asked.

"Getting ready to kill myself."

"What? Are you serious?"

"No, wait." Andy interrupted. "I wanna see where this is goin'.

"Shut up Andy." I said. "Why do you want to kill yourself Tucker?"

"Well, let me count the reasons. We're stuck at another military outpost after first being rescued from Blood Gulch. We have no idea exactly where we are, no contact with command, limited food resource, and there are no chicks! I'm gonna drown myself."

"Do it. Do it. Do it. Do it." Andy began chanting in my head. I shook my helmet really fast, I know he hated that.

"Come on Tucker, you know that would just leave us without a soldier. Besides, if we have the same luck, you'll just come back as a ghost like I did. And I am not taking the time to bury you, cause you didn't bury me when I died"

"Fuck! I forgot about that. Man, I hate the army."

"We all do Tucker. We all do.

--

"What do you mean we're out of gas!?" O'Malley roared at the Zealot.

"I mean that the fuel reserves are low! We need to get out of slipspace, otherwise we'll run out of fuel and break down in the middle of space."

"But we need to get back to Snowbound! We need to revive Tex's body with the Flood serum! It is an integral part of my plan!"

"Spell integral." Gary remarked sarcastically.

"Silence, you fool!"

"Listen," the Zealot said. "I'll take us out of slipspace, and we'll look around for help. There has to be a planet around here somewhere, maybe even UNSC personnel. We're not far from Snowbound.

"Fine, take us out of Slipspace." The Zealot obeyed and took the ship out of slipspace travel. The white light that had been in front of them the entire trip faded away and the blackness of space revealed itself once more. There were no planets in view, but something else caught the Zealot's eye.

Ahead of the group, there flew a massive purple ship. The architecture of the ship looked like that of the Covenant's style. It was much larger than the Pelican that they sat in.

"It's a Covenant frigate." Gary said. "There aren't many left, most of them were destroyed in the Halo Wars. Most of them were commandeered by the Brutes after the Great Schism. I wonder what this one is doing here. We're just outside of UNSC space, any Covenant ship like that is supposed to be docked at the Elite home world of Sanghelios."

Suddenly the radio kicked on in the cockpit of the Pelican. A low cracked voice overtook the waves.

"This is the _Twilight Compunction_. Cut your engines and stay still. You are now being brought in via tractor beam Demons. You are now prisoners of the Holy Covenant Loyalist Empire."

"What in blue blazes is going on?" O'Malley asked.

"Holy Covenant Loyalist Empire? I've never heard of them." Gary added. The Zealot took hold of the radio microphone and pressed the intercom button.

"We are not hostile; we are simply lost and out of fuel. Our vehicle is of UNSC classification, but we are loyal to the Covenant alone."

"Understood, we will send a Banshee for you. Leave that heretic vehicle to rot."

"Yes, Captain." The Zealot replied.

"How in the hell did you do that?" O'Malley asked.

"Try dealing with the grunts in Battle Creek as long as I did, you'll learn a little something about diplomacy." Neither of the AIs added anything else.

The Covenant ship sent the Banshee they promised and the Zealot abandoned the Pelican. It didn't surprise him that as soon as he was safely away from the vehicle the frigate open fired and destroyed it.

Landing in the frigate wasn't so hard. There were a group of Jackals waving the landing wands, motioning the Zealot to move in and land. A group of Grunts in hardhats ran over and helped the Zealot out. The creatures in the loading bay were frightened by him, who was still clad in his red MJOLNIR armor.

"I mean you no harm." He assured them. "Where is the officer I spoke to on the radio?"

"That would be me." A low voice sounded in the large chamber. The Zealot looked up to see a large Brute pushing through the swarms of Jackals and Drones. The Brute was a massive creature. He was clad in black, red laced Chieftain armor. The Zealot could see a Gravity Hammer strapped to his back and a red Plasma Rifle in a holster on his right thigh. "I am Ship Master Gargantum; Brute Chieftain and commander of the _Twilight Compunction_. You are the only resident of the heretic vehicle?"

"Yes, sir. I am Pvt. Zea Lot. I have recently defected from the UNSC and wish to join the Covenant, with your blessings of course." O'Malley groaned about the name once more to the Zealot. Gary laughed as well.

"Very few humans have I come across that wish to join our ranks. We will have an induction ceremony later. For now however, we will need to confiscate your weapons and any other possessions you have with you. You will then be interrogated on what you know about the non-believers' security."

"Why would I need to do that?"

"We, the crew of the _Twilight Compunction_, are the only remaining Covenant Loyalists in the galaxy. We plan to attack the humans, retake the Halo rings and begin the Great Journey just as the hierarchs once envisioned."

The Zealot suddenly realized he had just gotten them into big trouble. O'Malley confirmed this.

"You buffoon!"

--

The elevator stopped as it reached the top floor of the tower. Tex had been walking for hours. Her ghostly form had yielded no exhaustion from the walking. She was awestruck when she found this magnificent tower. She couldn't believe the Forerunners would construct something this big.

A large hall stood in front of her. The silver walls were laced with blue lights and glass. That was not what caught her attention though. At the head of the hall, there was a large golden figure. The eye in the center resembled that of 343 Guilty Spark and the other ring monitors, but its body structure was entirely original. Prongs of metal sprung out from all points on the figure. It was only when she approached the figure in the massive cathedral that she realized it was only a hologram.

"Welcome Tex." An articulate voice said. It echoed throughout the hall.

"Who's there?" Tex replied. "Who are you?"

"My name is Medicant Bias. I am a Forerunner AI. I have been left dormant in these halls for many years."

"Medicant Bias? You're the Forerunner defector from the first Flood war. You left the Forerunners and joined the Flood during the war. How have you survived this long?"

"Yes that is true. But, I have repented. I have become all-knowing. I have forever been preserved on the Ark. This is my temple. The raised area below my hologram is my home, or as the Forerunners liked it called, my 'grave'."

"What do you want Medicant?"

"I want you Tex, I want you."

--

"Please take your hands off of us!" Gary yelled at the two minor Brutes who were escorting the Zealot to the prison blocks of the Frigate.

"Quiet construct!" the one on the left yelled. "I can't stand these things. They won't shut up. Why did the Ship Master insist on us protecting this leech again?"

"He wants it to divulge information about the security of the humans! This maggot may hold the key to the Great Journey." replied the one on the right.

"Hmph. This will all be much better once the Great Journey has come to fruition." The Brutes threw the Zealot into a cell with one arm each. A clanking sound startled them all. The Zealot realized he had dropped it. The Brutes picked up the vial of tan liquid and looked at it intently. The one on the left unscrewed the cap and poured a small bit out onto its finger. He moved it towards his lips.

"Don't do that!" the Zealot warned.

"Quiet maggot!" The Brute went along with it and licked the liquid off of his finger. "Bleh!" he complained. "Disgusting. Here, maggot. Keep your vile drink."

The Brutes didn't have time to lock the Zealot's cell when it hit. The Brute clutched his stomach in pain. He coughed up blood. His comrade tried to figure out what was wrong. The Brute writhed in pain on the ground. His body began to morph and change. His shoulder blade grew and enlarged. His skin began to discolor and his fingers pushed out and became tentacle like appendages. The other Brute brought up his Spike Rifle and aimed it at the Zealot.

"What is wrong with him!? What have you done!?" he yelled.

"It wasn't modified for Brute use!" Gary yelled back.

Once the Brute had stopped writhing, he began to stand. He did not look like he once had. He let out a guttural growl, his breath laced with green mist. The other Brute moved his Spiker to face his friend.

"THE PARASITE!?" As the Flood infested Brute attacked his friend, the Zealot ran as fast as he could back to the Flight Hanger. The Flood had taken this ship, and he couldn't stop it. O'Malley once again accosted him.

"Nice job, moron. You just took out an entire ship with the Flood vaccine. Now what are we going to do about Tex?" the Zealot couldn't help wonder why O'Malley didn't care more about the resurrection of the Flood.


	10. This is No Time To Panic

**Episode 110 – This is No Time to Panic**

"RUN!" Gary screamed into the Zealot's ears.

"You don't think I know that!?" he replied. The purple hallways of the _Twilight Compunction_ were a blur as he ran down them. He was trying to return to the hanger to escape from the doomed frigate that he had inadvertently doomed. O'Malley still was yelling insults with no apparent care for the Flood, only that he now had no way to revive Tex.

"I can't believe you let that Brute do that!" he said. "You realize my plans are ruined now, right?"

"It wasn't my fault!" the Zealot yelled. "You saw how much bigger they were than us. They would have killed me and you wouldn't have a minion anymore." The Zealot stopped. He had arrived at a nexus of two hallways and there were three choices of where to go. He wasn't really paying attention while the Brutes were escorting him to the cells.

"Where are we?" he asked. "Which hall do we take? I don't remember where we came from."

"Just another achievement of a worthless buffoon!"

"You know O'Malley; you need to learn some new insults!"

"Silence, fool!"

"Psst!" a voice said from behind them. The Zealot whipped around and pulled out his shotgun to face it at the source of the voice.

"Don't shoot!" the voice said. From an alcove in the hallway behind them, a Grunt walked out and held up his hands. The group found this odd as a Grunt's reputation was for cowardice.

"Who are you?" Gary asked.

"My name is Kapyal." said the little Grunt through his methane re-breather. "I mean you no harm. I want to help. No way am I risking my life to help these Covenant idiots. I never really believed in the Great Journey anyway."

"Where's the hanger?" The Zealot asked.

"The middle hallway; I'll show you, follow me." The little Grunt ran past the Zealot and waved for him to follow him. The Zealot followed without thinking.

--

"What is this?" Tex asked Medicant Bias.

"It is your body. My drones retrieved it from the outpost where it was being held." Tex stared down at herself. Her armor's cryo system had maintained it in perfect preserved condition. Her face looked so serene as it stared back at her past her short red hair.

"Why?' she asked the great hologram.

"You're no good to me dead. I am going to revive you. The UNSC have developed a molecular regenerative vaccine created from the cells of their recovered Flood samples. In research, it has been shown to regenerate cells of a preserved body to the point that it can revive the dead, without compromising its cellular structure of the being and converting it to a Flood combat form. And, I have obtained a sample through my sources in the UNSC."

"You have spies in the UNSC? How did you manage that feat?"

"With the help of my drones, I have been able to send small copies of my programming through them and into the armor systems of the soldiers. My spies don't even know they work for me."

"Wow. Impressive. Sounds like you could declare war on the UNSC and win single-handedly if you wanted to."

"In my past life, I would have considered that. But, as I said earlier, I have repented and my plans have changed. However, I need a human avatar to travel with and execute them with me."

"What exactly are your plans?"

"All in good time. For now…" The AI trailed off as a floating Drone inserted a syringe into Tex's body's arm. She woke with a disorienting feeling,

--

Kapyal sprinted with all his might down the deserted hallways with the Zealot following. An alert had finally been issued and the lights were blinking red and a blaring noise echoed throughout the _Twilight Compunction_. The noise was almost deafening to the Zealot, but he found it as a bonus that the noise also suppressed Gary and O'Malley's voices.

"How much farther Kapyal?" he asked the little Grunt.

"The flight deck is just ahead, I'll help you steal a Phantom once we get there." A light appeared ahead of them. As they neared the exit of the hallway, the Zealot could see the Phantoms and Banshees lined up at the exit. Kapyal waved for him to follow and pointed at the nearest Phantom. The alarm noise lowered as they entered the hanger bay.

"What in the world was that noise?" O'Malley asked once the Zealot could hear again. "Why does the alarm have to be that loud? Is the Covenant deaf or something?"

"Well, I just about am now after hearing it." Gary replied.

"Quiet!" The Zealot yelled. "Do you need to keep talking to me every second? I mean, for the love of the flag, shut up!"

"Oh no!" Kapyal yelled. The Zealot looked ahead to see at least three dozen Jackals and Brutes succumbing to the Flood strain in the hanger bay. Infection forms skittered around the floor and attacked them. A group of Grunts stood by the Phantom Kapyal now ran toward. The Zealot followed.

"What's going on?" one Grunt asked.

"The Parasite has been revived!" Kapyal exclaimed. "We need to get out of here. This soldier can help us, he will not hurt us." The Zealot nodded when the Grunts looked up at him in fear.

"What are you doing?" roared O'Malley. "Why are you helping them?"

"You need more minions don't you O'Malley?" countered the Zealot.

"Ugh, I suppose you're right. Fine, now get us out of here!" The Zealot ran onto the Phantom with Kapyal and the Grunts in tow. He ripped Gary out of his head and pushed him into the control panel.

"Come on Gary, get us out of here!" he yelled.

"Engines charging, boosters accelerating, preparing for takeoff." The Phantom jolted with speed and rocketed off, out of the flight deck. The Zealot did not look back at the _Twilight Compunction_ as they left.

"Well that was easy." said O'Malley, who notable did nothing but complain the whole time.

--

"Hello," I said into the microphone of Lopez's internal radio. I was in Red Base trying to get contact from someone. "this is Captain Leonard L. Church of Blood Gulch Squadron. Our Pelican dropship classification number Kilo-31 has crashed in the area of Outpost 17-B a.k.a. Valhalla. We need assistance as we do not know our exact location. Does anyone read me?" Static was the reply given to me.

"Damn!" I yelled as I punched the ground. I haven't been able to get a signal since we had gotten there. They had no way of contacting the UNSC, and (if I knew Gary's lying ways) they probably thought we had gotten home okay already.

"No luck, huh?" I turned to see Sarge standing behind me. I nodded to him and stood up.

"What are you doing here? I thought you hated me."

"I have my prejudices against Blues, and those will be hard to overcome. I also have Grif hatreds, which I will never give up. But, I see that you're trying to help us, and that I respect you for."

"I was wondering, why do you insist on keeping Grif on your team if you hate him so much. Why not just transfer him to Blue team?"

"If I lost Grif, all I would have is Simmons."

"I see your point."

"I guess my relationship with Grif is like your relationship with Tucker. We are forced to be together, and we hate it. But, while we still hate it, what would we do without them."

"We all need the village idiot, I guess."

"That's absolutely right. Come on, let's go play some Grifball."

"Is that all you do?"

"Two reasons. One, what else do we have to do?"

"And two?" Sarge didn't reply because I should have known that by now.

--

It was quiet on the _Cairo_. Master Chief was walking down the halls on his midnight patrol.

"You know that Private you met earlier was a fake." Cortana told him.

"I saw the Flood vaccine in his hands. The guys on the flight deck said that he came from Rat's Nest. If he went to the trouble to get here and steal the vaccine to heal himself, I wasn't about to stop him."

"I understand that, but I found a forged ID in the database and an altered guard list that corresponded with the name he gave you."

"He was probably just paranoid. Maybe he altered the list to give a reason that would give him time to get away. Forget about it. He sounded like a good enough kid. He was wearing the experimental standard issue MJOLNIR armor too, just like the guys from Blood Gulch. He definitely wasn't a SPARTAN and he wasn't one of ours. At best, he was lost and injured and needed help. Maybe he was hurt by O'Malley."

"Well, Church did mention a red armored soldier that everyone just called 'the Zealot'."

"Why 'the Zealot', again?"

"Because he worshipped a flag as a god for some reason. I can't imagine why."

"Oh yeah…that guy. Well, it could have been him, but who knows." Static suddenly appeared on the intercom system. Strangely, Lord Hood's voice appeared on the waves. He rarely ever used the intercom.

"Chief, come to the bridge. You're gonna need to see this." Chief went without thinking. It wasn't a long walk to get to the bridge from where he was. The doors slid open and he walked in. Lord Hood stood at the head of the room. He turned to see Chief.

"Don't talk, just listen." Hood said. "We intercepted the following transmission a few minutes ago. We traced it already, and it apparently came from a decommissioned and captured Covenant frigate."

"A Covenant frigate? Aren't those supposed to be…"

"Yes Spartan. They are." A voice said. Chief looked to his left to see a transmission screen activated. An Elite showed on it, he sat on a throne and wore a platinum set of armor. He had polished it since Chief had last seen him, but he still hadn't taken it off. He would be the Arbiter until his dying day.

"Whoa. If Hood got you in on this, something terrible must be happening."

"Terrible would be an understatement. Lord Hood, play it." Hood nodded to a marine behind him who clicked a button combination on his keyboard. The audio transmission played on the speakers.

"I am a monument to all your sins." Said a low gravely voice from the speakers. Master Chief's spine locked in place as he registered the voice. "Now the gate has been unlatched, headstones pushed aside, corpses shift and offer room; a fate you must abide. You will be exterminated. I know you are listening. We will soon exist together, two corpses in one grave."

"Gravemind…" Cortana muttered.

"As you can see Spartan, we have a problem."

"Where was the message transmitted from?" Chief asked.

"Our frigates are all docked at Sanghelios. The ship that this message came from a rebel Covenant Loyalist ship known as the _Twilight Compunction_."

"But where was the message coming from?" Cortana pleaded. Hood answered.

"Our traces say that the _Compunction_ is currently in a standing orbit near Pluto."


	11. TRANSMISSION FROM THE AUTHOR

**Transmission!**

Dear Fans,

First off, I would like to apologize for the long wait time for another new chapter. I am currently writing this from a computer terminal in my high school because I just got the idea to address this fanfic and tell you about the progress made on it. _Red Vs Blue 2: The Valhalla Chronicles_ is a unique story for me. If I could I would make it in machinima form, I would. However, that would mean I would need to be good at machinimating (at which I am only moderate) and I would need permission from Rooster Teeth to build upon their amazing series (which I will not get in a million years). Even then, without Rooster Teeth, is it truely RvB? No it is not.

Secondly, I would like to address the storyline of this tale. What originally began as a nice little continuation of the Blood Gulch boys has quickly mutated into a story with a life of it's own. The inclusion of Master Chief was only supposed to be short and in the introductory episodes. However, I have recently resurrected Gravemind, brought the Arbiter back, and had the Flood take over the _Twilight Compunction_. The Blood Gulch boys haven't been seen much and the story is taking a turn towards the serious side rather than comedic. Now, this is not to say I am doing away with this storyline entirely, more than I am simply winding it up and staring a new story arc.

You see, I began _the Valhalla Chronicles_ before the release of RvB: Reconstruction (which was probably the best Rooster Teeth series made so far). This storyline has given me new ideas and changed my perspective on much of the Blood Gulch Chronicles. Agent Washington is an amazing character, The Meta is downright disturbing yet cool, The Freelancer program is a great story element, and the AI's…I mean who doesn't love Delta? Thus, The new season (yes I said season, I know I'm crazy) will do away with the Flood storyline and begin anew with the retooled story.

Unlike _My Own Worst Enemy _on NBC (which if you haven't seen it and choose to watch _Kath & Kim_ instead, shame on you) I will not leave you on a cliffhanger ending and simply cut off this season here. I will simply finish this storyline ASAP and begin my new one. Hopefully I will feel better about this new one.

Thirdly, as always, I would like to thank all my loyal fans (all ten of ya!) who keep this story close to them in their favorites list. Reviews are the highest point of my day if I get them. The fact that you took the time (however miniscule) to write a review of my story, means so much to me.

Fourth, I will give you some hints as to the content of the next episode. It is entitled "PANIC!!!" to go with the last chapter title of "This Is No Time To Panic." I will be returning to Valhalla, where we last left our daring heroes. We will also get some major development on the Tex/Medicant Bias story which I have cloaked in so much mystery that even I need security clearance! Plus, we will see some more of the antics of The Zealot/O'Malley/Gary and Kapyal. I promise that things are coming together finally. Oh, and also, Gravemind will be dealt with off-screen. We will not see much of Master Chief, but Cortana will play some part in the new storyline.

Finally, I would like to encourage the fans' participation in this story. Anyone who reads it may post their own ideas in a review. In it, you may suggest your hearts desire no matter how stupid the ideas sound. Who knows? I may use some of them.

Thank you once again for taking the time to read this message and the other chapters of _RvB 2: The Valhalla Chronicles_. I try my best for people to enjoy my stories, and I'm glad if you do.

Signed,

EvilProduct, Captain 2nd grade of the UNSC. (yes that's my Halo 3 rank)


	12. PANIC!

_--I know, I know, "Finally! He posted another episode! Freaking cockbite!" Enjoy. And please no bitching. See previous chapter for info on this one.--_

**Episode 111 – PANIC!!****!**

"Oh, crap, oh crap, oh crap, oh crap, oh crap, oh crap!" The Zealot chanted as Gary pulled away from the _Twilight Compunction_. "Tell me this thing has a slipspace drive! Shaw-Fujikawa, ultraspeed, lightspeed, I don't care! Just get us as far away from that ship as possible!"

"Would you please calm down?" Gary replied. "I can get us away, just let me get acquainted with these controls. I've never piloted a Phantom before."

"Oh, well that's just great." O'Malley added. "Give the guy who can't pilot the Pelican for anything control of our only escape vehicle. What a great idea."

"Is there a mute function on him?" Kapyal asked from behind the Zealot.

"Were it so easy." Gary answered.

--

Tex felt good back in her body. It didn't take her long to get her bearings back. Medicant Bias now held refuge in her head. He was definitely not as annoying as Omega. She found his voice very soothing and calming, not anything like any of her old acquaintances from Blood Gulch.

She was back in the desert. Her boots sunk at least three inches in the grainy earth as she walked.

"What exactly are these things?" she asked Medicant Bias

"These are the ruins of the earliest of the Forerunners." Spoke the AIs melodic voice. "They were built before even I was created. Originally, they were to be a great temple where us AIs were to be stored. It was like a big apartment complex. The Forerunners abandoned it and evacuated the AIs after my defection to the Flood."

"Are you surprised?"

"Not really. I'm more curious as to why they didn't decommission me. They sealed me away in that lonesome prison of a temple with full control of it's functions. If they truly hated me, then they would have had me executed."

"Maybe they knew you were going to stay good."

"Not likely. My theory is that they believed I would die slowly over the years. Luckily, my system seems to have gone rampant and reached the fabled level of _meta-stability_." Tex thought about the word, knowing she'd heard it before.

"The closest an AI can come to being a human?"

"Precisely." Tex walked on.

--

"What are our coordinates?" O'Malley asked Gary. He had been growing increasingly impatient as the trio's trip got even longer.

"I can't read this Covenant text. I haven't downloaded that data yet."

"Worthless henchmen…" was O'Malley's only reply.

"I can read it!" said Kapyal behind the Zealot.

"What does it say?" asked the Zealot.

"We are currently within the Milky Way galaxy. The planet we just passed on our way out was Pluto."

"Earth is near here!" announced the Zealot.

"Brilliant deduction, Mr. Holmes." The Zealot did not respond to O'Malley's insult. He turned to Kapyal.

"Can we get to Earth?" he asked.

"There is a jump drive on this ship. If you activate it, we should be there in a matter of hours." said the little Grunt.

"Great, we need to regroup after this." said Gary.

"I'll drive." Kapyal said. "I know this ship better than most Grunts."

"Gary, switch to manual pilot." said the Zealot. "Let Kapyal drive."

"Okay." The Zealot pulled Gary out of the AI drive on the ship and allowed Kapyal to take the pilot's seat. The little Grunt was quick in finding the exact combination of buttons to activate the slipspace drive. The ship jolted forward and pulled its current crew across the universe.

--

The teleporter! Why hadn't I thought about it before? It's what took us away from Blood Gulch in the first place. Two years ago that damn teleporter took us all away from that goddamn box canyon. Now I was staring at another one in Valhalla. Why hadn't I even looked at it since we got here?

"How about another round of Grifball?" Oh yeah, that's why.I think we've played about twenty thousand rounds of Grifball since we had crash landed here. You'd think we'd be sick of it. But not really; every time Grif got hit with a Gravity Hammer, I felt a little warm inside.

"Don't answer that Church. Please for the love of god." Grif pleaded.

"Shut up dirtbag." Sarge was always quick with his insults.

"Actually," I began, "I think I've found a way out of here."

"Really? How?" Simmons asked.

"Well, last time we used the teleporter in Blood Gulch when O'Malley attacked us, it sent us all over the place. Caboose and Sarge got sent to Battle Creek, Grif and me went to Sidewinder, and Simmons got sent to that nexus of portals."

"I still think it was a janitor's closet." Simmons was quick with his contradiction.

"But that was only after Sheila busted it." Donut added. "Before that, the teleporter only sent you to the exit point in the middle of the canyon. Just like that one over there." Donut pointed over in the direction of the exit point where Tucker, Caboose, Doc, and Sister now stood. Tucker's insistence on throwing rocks through the teleporter again was what had spurred my current train of thought. They were now ogling over the burnt charred rocks that laid on the ground around the teleporter exit.

"I know, but you seemed to be pretty good at rewiring t Simmons. Maybe you could do it again." I was hopeful that I would hear the answer I wanted. And I was not at all surprised at the answer I got.

"I don't know. It looks much more complicated that the teleporter in Blood Gulch." Simmons replied. Alright, new plan.

"Maybe Grif could do it. He seems to be much smarter than you Simmons." That oughta do the trick.

"What!? I'll show you!" Simmons was prying the maintenance panel of the teleporter off within seconds. Sarge was suddenly laughing.

"Nice use of reverse psychology Church. Not too shabby."

"You know I actually think Grif could do it. He's just too lazy to actually do it." I think Simmons heard that since he suddenly sped up his work after I said it. Sarge began to laugh harder.

"That may be the most hilarious thing I've ever heard, Grif being good at something. That's rich."

"I'm serious, I think he may act-"

"I appreciate the effort, but dude, I wouldn't keep going. He will never believe you." Grif said, cutting me off. It would probably be for the best.

--

The _Forward Unto Dawn II_, one of many UNSC frigates built after the end of the Halo wars. Only months after its completion it was given a captain, Master Chief Petty Officer John-117. It was Master Chief's first time in the captain's seat. Lord Hood stood to his left, the Arbiter to his right. The _Twilight Compunction_ was in a standing orbit in front of the frigate. It had taken the _Forward Unto Dawn II_ only an hour in slipspace to reach it. Gravemind was on that ship.

"Do you think this will work Spartan?" asked the Arbiter.

"It better." Cortana said. "We don't have much of a choice. The Flood can't be allowed to live. Not in this galaxy."

"Call all other UNSC frigates," Master Chief ordered. "Position them around the _Compunction_. Enforce caution and arm their MAC guns."

"Aye, Aye, Master Chief." The Captain of _In Amber Clad II_ responded. The captains of the _Aegis Fate, Midsummer Night, Vostok II, Gorgon, Meriwether Lewis, _and_ Gettysburg_ followed suit. All the captains ordered their men to arm their MAC guns.

"Exercise caution, men." Hood added. "After the _Compunction _is destroyed, consider the target area to be in biohazard lockdown. The Arbiter's men will take it from there."

"Glass the debris my brothers. The parasite will not be allowed to leave the _Compunction _alive." Master Chief looked up at his friend. He was a true leader to his people.

"The Arbiter's will be done." Rtas 'Vadum's voice came over the intercom. Old Half-Jaw seemed just as optimistic as ever. He had remained the Arbiter's trusted friend since the end of the Halo Wars.

"You cannot stop me. My Flood will slaughter you with glee." The Gravemind's ever present use of rhyming warnings had become annoying to Master Chief. It was time to end this.

"All units ready MAC guns. Lock on target. Fire on my mark." They were ready.

"Aye, Aye." Hs troops announced. "MAC guns locked on target and ready to fire."

"On my mark. 5…4…3…2…1…" The Arbiter, Hood, Cortana and Chief shouted the last command in unison.

"FIRE!!!"

--

An explosion of light suddenly blinded The Zealot. It cascaded through the slipspace around them and almost knocked the crew to the floor.

"What the hell is that!?" the Zealot yelled.

"It looks like an explosion went off somewhere nearby." Gary said.

"If that light's from an explosion, where's the force it caused?" O'Malley wondered aloud.

Then, as if by some cosmic insult, the Phantom was suddenly rocked with a massive force from its port side. Kapyal was all but knocked unconscious by the explosion's push. The Zealot was knocked unconscious as his skull bashed against the wall of the Pelican.

"Wake up you fool! Wake up!"

"Zealot, wake up!"

The Phantom drifted into the far reaches of space. Kapyal disabled the slipspace drive as soon as he could.

--

"Hey Tucker, what's that?" Caboose asked. Simmons and the Reads were still at Blue base tinkering with the teleporter. I decided to go back to Blue base earlier, where Caboose and Tucker were now lounging on the top deck. I lifted my sniper rifle to see the object in the sky Caboose was now fixated on.

"I don't know, it kinda looks like a purple meteor." What an idiot. Through my sniper rifle, I could clearly see that it wasn't a meteor. It was a purple ship. A big purple ship that was falling from the sky. A big purple ship that was falling from the sky at an increasingly alarming rate. A big, purple, falling ship that was (gulp) headed right for this canyon! I clicked on my radio and broadcast to everyone in the canyon.

"EVERYBODY HIT THE DECK!"


	13. Screw You Inc

**Episode 112 – Screw You Inc.**

Why in god's name did I join this army? First, Master Chief basically carries the UNSC and destroys the Covenant army. Then, I get stuck in that goddamn box canyon called Blood Gulch. Then, I crash land in this new box canyon with everyone I hate most in the world. And now, a Covenant Phantom crash lands not 20 yards from Blue base carrying GOD KNOWS WHAT!!

I don't know why I joined this army, but I sure as hell know how to conduct myself in it. Cardinal rule when shit goes down-Duck and cover. As soon as I saw that fuckin ship in the sky I told everyone to find cover. Hopefully, that might minimize casualties to the people I hate most...Simmons maybe.

No one was hurt (fuck). The Phantom crashed around the same spot our Pelican landed when we got here. No shrapnel impaled anyone. No explosion burned anyone. No impact of any kind hit anyone. God. Damn. It.

I was the first to get back up. Tucker and Caboose stayed on the ground.

"It's safe you guys," I assured them. "It didn't hit us."

"Are you sure?" Caboose asked. "Because I can clearly see a white light."

"That's your suit's flashlight dumbass." Tucker told him. "You tried signaling S.O.S. and realized you couldn't do Morse code; and you were facing the floor; and it was daylight."

"Are you sure? I heard an angel while I was dead. He said 'everybody hit the deck'."

"That was me! Two fucking minutes ago!" I almost regretted promoting him to Loot at that moment, but then I considered the options. Seeing Caboose give orders to Simmons and Tucker…well, it's…it's great…it's really great. I dropped the issue of a confused Caboose (we'll probably come back to that later) in favor of a much more sane idea.

"I think we should inspect the wreckage." I said it was more sane than arguing with Caboose. I didn't say it was completely sane.

"Are you out of your fucking mind?" Tucker yelled to me. "You want to inspect that thing? That's like asking Donut to produce evidence of a girlfriend of any kind. It can't and won't be done!" Ah, Tucker. So quick with the laziness and the sarcasm.

"Fine cockbite, I'll leave you here. Caboose, you coming?"

"Are you sure you want me for this?"

"You're my second in command! You're coming with me!" Caboose shrunk back a bit when I yelled. I felt a bit of regret for that.

"Hey," Andy said in my head. "I'm actually with the dumb one on this. I haven't had the best luck with crashed ships."

"Shut up, bomb boy. I'm goin, so you're goin."

"But what about the people in the Phantom?" Sheila piped up. "It's a Covenant vehicle. The pilot and crew can't be good if that's their transport."

"All of you. Shut up. Follow me. Now."

"But-"

"No buts Tucker, follow me. Dumbass." Tucker sighed and we started walking towards the purple wreckage. I do not have a good feeling about this.

--

"Uhhh…what the hell happened?" The Zealot groaned. "Where are we?"

"Do you want the short version or the long version?" O'Malley asked.

"Long."

"An explosion went off. You probably got a concussion, and then we crashed landed in this canyon."

"That's the long version? Really?"

"If you picked the short version he was going to say 'you fucked up'." Gary explained.

"Quiet, you fool."

"How's the crew?" The Zealot asked. He looked around the cabin. Sadly, all the Grunts on board were laying on the floor, seemingly unconscious.

"They're all dead." Kapyal answered. "I will miss them dearly."

"Sorry about them."

"Much appreciated." Kapyal seemed to be shaping up to be the most decent being the Zealot had ever met before. He liked that.

"Alright, let's find a way out of here."

--

"Well, it looks like we've left the desert behind us." Tex was now treading upon grass laden ground. Medicant Bias had led her away from the desert and she was now in a lush grassy landscape. It wasn't quite a forest, but there were still trees all around.

"This forest was the newest of the piece of the Ark." The AI explained. "The desert we just left once was a beautiful place, but because of my treachery, it was left to rot. They created this forest as the new safe haven for any travelers or survivors after the firing of the Halo rings. It provides shelter and food for any species that were to inhabit it."

Tex slowed her walk as she approached a large cliff. The river she had been following turned into a waterfall at the edge and fell over to the canyon below. Tex looked over the cliff.

"Hey, what's that?" She asked.

"Now this is news to me. I remember watching the Forerunners build this canyon. The pyres on either side are stasis sustaining pillars that help keep the force field protecting the Ark from debris caused by the Halo rings firing up. They seem to have been converted to military posts. The transports on the snow falls seem newly arrived as well."

"The big one's a Pelican dropship, UNSC classification. I think the other one's Covenant class."

"Life signs detected!" Medicant suddenly barked. "Initial scans indicate approximately 12 heat signals."

"Can you get a lock on them?"

"Negative; not from this height. Update: life signs show signal tags of SPARTAN armor. Should I hack into the UNSC mainframe to acquire records of certification IDs?"

"Do I need to answer?"

"I started before I asked. Tags acquired."

"What are they doing?" Tex asked herself, ignoring Medicant briefly. She had caught sight of three soldiers walking over to the debris of the fallen Phantom dropship. The one in front held a sniper rifle in his hands, which he aimed at the back door of the Phantom.

"No. No, it can't be. That's impossible." Tex began to remember things about her previous adventures she'd rather forget.

"May I ask what the problem is?" Medicant asked, breaking Tex's hypnotic stare.

"I bet you twenty bucks I can tell you who those soldiers are before you can tell me."

"Try me."

--

"Whoever that is, come out now." God, I hope this works. Caboose and Tucker stood behind me at the moment and I had my sniper sights trained on the shield door of the Phantom. Whoever was in there, if they came out, would be met by my gun in their face. Yeah! That is, if this fucking this would shoot right! It's not me, I swear.

"Listen to the dumbass with the gun!" Tucker said.

"Come out come out where ever you are!" Caboose added.

--

"Wait," O'Malley told the Zealot. "Those voices sound familiar."

I know, right?" Gary added. "I just can't quite place where I've heard them before."

"Well," The Zealot shrugged. "we'll see in a minute." He raised his shotgun and readied his leg to kick the back door open. Kapyal was shaking as he pulled up his Energy pistol and aimed it at the door. The Zealot's foot went up and connected with the door.

--

The back door of the Phantom burst off the hinges of the ship. I almost fired a round or two when it did. There was a whole lotta smoke still in the cabin that came pouring out when the steel door fell to the ground. I couldn't see who was inside at the moment.

"I have a gun on whoever just did that!" I yelled. "Put your hands up before I start firing blindly into the smoke motherfucker!"

"Hey, what's going on?" It was Sarge. Apparently, his attention had been grabbed by the ship as well and he made the rest of Blood Gulch squadron follow him to the wreckage.

"Oh good, Lopez tell me if you see any heat signatures in the smoke." The robot had walked up to my side at the same moment Sarge had.

"Life signs detected." He said.

"How many?" Grif asked.

"Why do you of all people want to know?" Simmons asked him.

"So I know how many to run away from, duh."

"Maybe they're friendly!" Donut wondered aloud.

Doc and Sister stayed quiet at the moment, just holding each other in their arms. How can Doc get a girl like Sister, but Tex fucking hated me? I don't think I'll ever know.

"Shut the fuck up!" I told them. "All of you! I hear another word from any of you, I will fucking kill you all right now! Now Lopez, how many life signs!"

"Approximately two, but my speech recognition system is picking up four voices from inside."

"Well then that's gotta be busted," Sarge said. "Just let me take a look at that for you."

"Sarge," I said. "If you even think about touching Lopez, so help me god I will shove this Sniper Rifle so far up your ass, your spits will be fifty caliber." Sarge shut up after that.

"Hello?" asked a voice from the smoke. "Who's there? We need help."

"Fuck yeah you do!" I said. Geez, I gotta lay up on the cursing. My blood pressure may go overboard.

"Everyone calm down, we have no evil or otherwise diabolical intentions here…yet, absolutely no plans to kill you all and take control of this place, none at all." What a warm wel- wait a minute…I know that voice.

"We come in peace! By the flag we do!" By the flag? What the fuck?

"We're telling the truth! For once!" Gary!? Was that Gary!?

The smoke began to clear and we were astonished as before us stood the Red Zealot from Battle Creek Canyon. Beside that flag-worshipping numbskull stood a little Covenant Grunt, which I recognized from my days at the Academy. I could only guess that the other two voices were coming from the Zealot's helmet.

"Hey! It's that guy!" Caboose yelped with glee. Why? I don't know. Last time we saw the Zealot, he was trying to kill us under O'Malley's orders.

"Shut up Caboose!" I said. "Don't you recognize the other voices? The Zealot has O'Malley and Gary in his helmet."

"What!?" Andy suddenly screamed in my ear.

"Jesus H. Christ Andy, that fucking hurt!"

"Sorry, but if those two are here, that means I didn't destroy them, which means my exploding did nothing, which hurts my ego." What a moron.

"Blast!" O'Malley yelled. "It's those fools from the other canyon! What are they doing here? Here to ruin my plans for world domination again you worthless twits?"

"Yeah pretty much." I cocked back the bolt on my rifle and aimed at the Zealot's head.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! What the hell man!? Kapyal and me don't want to hurt you guys! That's just O'Malley!"

"You traitorous buffoon!" O'Malley shouted. "As my minion, all my goals are yours as well. You should want to tear their throats out and conquer the universe!"

"Shut up!" Kapyal yelled.

"Yeah!" Grif added.

"Stay out of this!" Gary said. It wasn't long before the canyon's inhabitants were enveloped in a hateful rave of anger and arguments. I did the best I could to keep my head from exploding. Allow me a moment of mental zen. _Bullet in Tucker's head…Bullet in Tucker's head…Bullets in Tucker's head..._Well, I feel a little better.

And then Tucker speaks again. Ugh…

--

Tex had her sniper's sights trained on one particular individual in the crowd. Medicant Bias whispered in her ear.

"Wind stabilized, Sights acquired, Target in range, fire at will."

"Are you sure you were just an operational AI?" Tex asked.

"You'd be surprised how much can be learned from a single UNSC computer terminal."

"I can imagine." Tex tightened her grip on the rifle's handle. "Here we go" Her sights readied, and the wind stopped, Tex squeezed her finger, and pulled the trigger.

A shot rang out.

**END OF SEASON 1**

**THE BLOOD GULCH BOYS WILL RETURN IN SEASON 2 OF RVB: THE VALHALLA CHRONICLES!**

**STAY TUNED!!!!**


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